Report From "Get The Facts" 475
Richard W.M. Jones writes "Huw Lynes wrote an interesting
report from Microsoft's
"Get The Facts" show in London
(earlier
Slashdot story).
Along with the report he provides some
analysis of their apparent strategy, which
includes equating "Shared Source" with "Open Source"
and making out that Linux isn't free."
Free Software (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Free Software (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Free Software (Score:4, Funny)
One word - divorce
Re:Free Software (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Free Software (Score:5, Interesting)
Then IE never comes back and Firefox is nice and snappy.
Interesting context... (Score:5, Funny)
making out that Linux isn't free
This is one of the few ways that Linux will ever be associated with "making out"...
Spin Doctors (Score:5, Interesting)
Microsoft must be suffering if they are going at Open Source head on. I remember taking an advertising class once, and we studied the Coke/Pepsi Cola War. Essentially Coke was the biggest cola company on the block, until they acknowledged Pepsi as a competitor. By doing so, Coke gave Pepsi the kind of credit they needed to gain significant market share, and obtain lucrative endorsement celebrities, who may not have supported Pepsi if Coke had held the "one true cola" stance and simply ignored Pepsi.
The bottom line is that Microsoft is taking a page from Coke, and they are going to lose out bigtime in doing so, because their math is voodoo math, and they charge exorbitant license fees, so their cost of usage will always be much much higher than Open Source, no matter which spindoctor tries to make it look and taste differently than it is.
Re:Spin Doctors (Score:3, Insightful)
HA! Try telling my BOSS that. --- seriously though, Microsoft is very expensive upfront, but what they do have going for them, and this will keep them around, is
Re:Spin Doctors (Score:5, Insightful)
Their toolkits are well documented and very easy to get started in. Also a lot of their development (& -tools) is focused not on making the right choice, but giving the most fancy features and ease of use to developers and users alike. Because of this there are many many Windows developers who with limited skill can already contribute to the windows software pool, and thus making more software available for Windows, and making getting Windows developers cheaper then getting Linux developers.
However there are also those who feel this is also the weakness of Microsoft. By making API's and tools that are not technicly the best solution it'll burst in due time (who doesn't know of the socket handle leak that MS can't fix because otherwise they'd break 1000's of apps). Also by making it easy to develop for and maintain Microsoft software, the engineers and administrators often have no clue of underlying issues thus leading to lots of bugs and exploitable situations..
There's something to be said for forcing people to understand a situation before allowing them to contribute
Re:Spin Doctors (Score:5, Insightful)
You might as well have said "there are many many Windows hax0rs who with limited skill can already contribute to the windows worm pool"
Re:Spin Doctors (Score:3, Insightful)
But that would have been kind of a dumb argument, seeing as how it isn't the simplicity of an API that leads to worms, but rather the size of the install base. If Fort Knox didn't have as much gold in it, it wouldn't need as many guards. Writing self modifying, self replicating code under 10k isn't exactly child's play.
Re:Spin Doctors (Score:4, Insightful)
Just because A happens and B also happens, doesn't mean A is the cause of B. If you're still not convinced, I've some elephant repellent you might be intrested to buy
Re:Spin Doctors (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, that's kind of an unfair example as well. Comparing IIS to Apache is not apples to apples; it's more like comparing apples to a fruit stand. IIS is WAY more than a webserver that connects to processing modules; it is an ambitious product that also does what PHP, Sendmail, Courier IMAP, Pure FTP, BIND and inetd do, to name a few.
Re:Spin Doctors (Score:4, Insightful)
-
Re:Spin Doctors (Score:3, Insightful)
"The final part of the show was a Q and A session with the two Nicks, Philip Dawson and Colin Bradford chaired by the aforemention daytime TV horror-show. Eddie Bleasdale of Netproject asked the most insightful question. He talked about a customer of his who had lost data because it was in old Microsoft file formats that couldn't be read by current Microsoft products. This was slickly dealt with by McGrath who suggested that he should get the Microsoft people to talk to him after the sho
Re:Spin Doctors (Score:5, Insightful)
Which toolkits are you referring to? VB? VC++?
The toolkit itself may be well documented (in the "this is how you place a button widget" or "this is how you write a click event handler" sort of way), but the actual Windows APIs for doing anything are fucking terrible.
Different portions of it (interfaces to different
For example, running any Delphi-written application on XP (with SP1, this problem does not occur pre-SP1) with a P4 processor with HyperThreading enabled causes the app to crash on startup.. (placing it in Win98/ME "compatibility" mode makes the mysterious crash go away, but it took a lot of snopping to find that workaround)
I'm getting REALLY fed up with windows programming. I don't use Microsoft's toolkits because VB is too simple and VC++ is too complex, but I'm still forced to use their shitty APIs. In fact, I'm so sick of it, that I'm currently learning python, and plan to move most of my development to an OS-neutral platform.. let someone else fight with the Win32 API for days on end.
Re:Spin Doctors (Score:4, Informative)
this Article "How Microsoft Lost the API War" [joelonsoftware.com] by Joel Spolsky, really goes into detail on how and why this happened. Definitely a MUST READ.
Robert
Re:Spin Doctors (Score:3, Interesting)
We had a resident expert there who was paid god-knows-how-much and was referred to as the "resident guru" because he was the only person who knew all of the obscure things related to th
Re:Spin Doctors (Score:3, Informative)
That's true only if you are using the APIs correctly, in the documented ways, and there's no reason to assume Delphi is doing that. It's very possible that they are doing something buggy that they are not supposed to do (this is especially likely since this is during startup and dll entrypoints and such have real restrictions on what they are allowed to do; "funky stuff" is almost always b
sympathy for the devil (Score:5, Informative)
My sympathy levels for Microsoft engineers skyrocketted after reading this [asp.net] and this [asp.net], detailing the horrors they have to deal with in the name of compatability.
Re:sympathy for the devil (Score:3, Insightful)
It is not a level playing field.
With Open Source, you let them as committed the horrors figure out how to handle the horrors.
With Open Source, they are less likely to have committed the horrors in the first place, and even if they did, they are much more likely to have taken precautions so as to make a timely remedy much easier.
With Open Source, it is much easier to solve problems where the problems reside rather than having to concoct screw
A bit misleading (Score:5, Informative)
Essentially Coke was the biggest cola company on the block, until they acknowledged Pepsi as a competitor.
You say this as if they aren't still the biggest on the block. Coke is still (as it has always been) well ahead of Pepsi in both global market share and global market value. Their stock price is higher, and they still ship many more units / yaar then Pepsi. Sure Pepsi may have more flashy ads in the US, but that doesn't mean squat to their international presence. Just do a Google on the cola wars.
This said, if Linux ever got to the point that it was as much of a competitor to MS as Pepsi is to Coke, I'd be damn happy.
Re:A bit misleading (Score:5, Interesting)
The more Microsoft acknowledges Open Source and tries to fight it, the bigger Open Source will become, because of the law of diffusion.
It's a super bad analogy (Score:5, Insightful)
Even worse, does Airbus (or Boeing for that matter) manufacture every single of a million parts in a plane themselves?
Hell no! Certainly not. There's an abundance of suppliers supplying parts for a plane, from the altimeter to the leather chairs in first class.
You don't even have to go so far as to look at the airplane industry. Car manufacturers make only a miniscule percentage of the components themsleves. The rest is manufactured and delivered by suppliers.
Otherwise the cost for a car would be comparatively so outrageously high like the cost for some uh! software...
Re:It's a super bad analogy (Score:2, Informative)
Um, no they don't. Airbus is a consortuim of Aero companies in Europe who build 'planes. That's why the analogy by the Microsoft guy is so bad.
Top tip: Reading is fun. You should try it sometime.
Re:It's a super bad analogy (Score:5, Insightful)
That is a truely idiotic thing to say. There is hardly any manufactured product you can buy today that isn't made from components from supplied by other companies. Even the simplest products - like a pair of shoes for instance - will often be made up with leather from one company, rubber from another, laces from a third, metal components from a fourth, thread from another. And that's just a pair of shoes. I bet Boeing has thousands of suppliers.
Re:It's a super bad analogy (Score:4, Informative)
Most aircraft engines are made by GE.
Not wishing to be pedantic, but Rolls Royce [rolls-royce.com] is a UK PLC (NB. this Rolls Royce makes aircraft engines, not shiny luxery cars)
One point I've not seen made re: Airbus is that it's a consortium of various national aerospace companies - truly the worst analogy Microsoft could have dredged up. The closest match to AIrbus in the IT world would be - well, Linux, maybe, but that makes Airbus sound far more cool than they really are ;)
Re:It's a super bad analogy (Score:4, Informative)
The new firewall in XP is made by Ca from memory and Veritas made the crappy backup software in NT/2000....
Re:It's a super bad analogy (Score:4, Insightful)
Now compare Microsoft software: It is deliberately designed NOT to work with other software products, so it's a miracle that it actually does work in combination with anything else.
Heck, Microsoft product "A" has even been known to be incompatible with Microsoft product "B"! This even extends down to Microsoft "service packs"!!!
Re:It's a super bad analogy (Score:3, Informative)
Different parts of the airframe may well originate from different companies.
The same goes for avionics. For aircraft with propellers, the propellers are invariably made by speciality companies that make only propellers.
Similarly rotor blades and wings tend to come from specialist
Re:It's a super bad analogy (Score:3, Funny)
Monopoly! Monopoly! Monopoly!
Monopoly! Monopoly! Monopoly!
(now speak softer and get that crazy look in your eye)
Monopoly! Monopoly! Monopoly!
Monopoly! Monopoly! Monopoly!
Now you got it!
It's a worse analogy than that... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:It's a super bad analogy (Score:5, Informative)
@(#) Copyright (c) 1983 The Regents of the University of California.
All rights reserved.
"Linux training costs were 15% higher on average" (Score:5, Funny)
Well that's because training to fix windows is "just hit reset"
Re:"Linux training costs were 15% higher on averag (Score:2)
No Kidding (Score:2)
But, if you convert over to Linux you would have to give some basic training. Answer some employees questions. Seems a small price to pay
Re:"Linux training costs were 15% higher on averag (Score:3, Interesting)
From what I've seen companies spend about $0 on Windows training, so a 15% increase is still $0.
Re:"Linux training costs were 15% higher on averag (Score:5, Insightful)
If I took a Unix course back in 1989 (before Linux even had emerged) most of what I learnded then would still be somewhat useful in Linux of today. How much would 15 years old windows knowledge help me in manageing windows XP of today. Not much I think. Most likely I would have to have more frequent retraining if I run windows.
Unfair comparisons... of course they're going to w (Score:5, Insightful)
Perhaps if they faced the "facts", their study might be worth something.
And as for the comparison of Linux to a DOS prompt... Microsoft seems to think that adding a huge bloated GUI to a server OS is going to improve things. Well, I say that any half-decent system administrator should be able to do his job completely from a command-line interface and should not need a GUI.
Re:Unfair comparisons... of course they're going t (Score:4, Interesting)
Moreover, it exposes the degree to which Microsoft is engaging in "Not Invented Here" self-delusion for them to try and compare a DOS prompt (command.com and its standard utilities) to a real shell (bash, tcsh or zsh) and the standard set of utilities (the GNU file utils, find utils and text utils) that ship with most linux distributions.
Personally, I'd reverse the comparison and say the DOS prompt is "almost as good as a Unix shell."
Re:Unfair comparisons... of course they're going t (Score:5, Interesting)
Then you would, IMHO, be lying. The DOS prompt has never been even close to a match to a proper Unix shell. Even running bash with the full gnu toolchain in a Windows XP cmd.exe prompt (thankyou cygwin) is still much worse than using the real thing (even their mouse selection stuff is retarded. OK they cannot have X's nice selection style cut'n'paste, but at least make the default selection tool line oriented, rather than block (I cannot remember even once needing the kind of selection you get in cmd.exe, if your text is not neatly on one line)).
Re:Unfair comparisons... of course they're going t (Score:3, Interesting)
But if you know of any cmd.exe replacements, that don't require me to either log in through ssh or run the terminal under X (I run a root-less X server, but I would rather not have it involved in my terminals, since it seems slightly less stable than the native terminals (mostly when remote machines crash or hang and such)), I would be glad
Re:Unfair comparisons... of course they're going t (Score:5, Insightful)
Many companies like the one I work for require you to be able to get a service contract for any software. So, to use Linux they have to be able to get a service contract. That's why they go for those expensive ones. They have the service.
Well, I say that any half-decent system administrator should be able to do his job completely from a command-line interface and should not need a GUI.
You're figureing on half decent sys admins. Many of the ones I know can't do anyting outside the GUI. And they don't even have half of an understanding of what is really going on. Some have never even herd of
Funny? Pull that moderator's head out of his... (Score:3, Insightful)
MS is kinda scared... (Score:3, Insightful)
"MS is scared" posts (Score:5, Insightful)
But despite their apparent terror, they've still managed to maintain their market dominance. I don't really think Microsoft is as scared as some Slashdotters would make themselves believe they are. Show me where Linux has taken a significant bite out of Microsoft; then you might have a case.
Re:"MS is scared" posts (Score:4, Insightful)
Microsoft's "dominance" in the server market is NOTHING like what it is in the desktop market. Linux marketshare in the server market gives them more than adequate reason to fear the future of their desktop marketshare.
For the area of discussion of this particular roadshow: Microsoft simply is not "dominant".
Part of the page commented out (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Part of the page commented out (Score:5, Interesting)
A 2002 Microsoft-sponsored study of total costs of ownership over five years for working corporate infrastructure in North America shows that lower staffing expenses are a large part of an 11-22% cost advantage for Windows.
Microsoft-sponsored benchmarks prove that multiple Windows Web servers perform better than a Linux mainframe acting as a Web server consolidator. An independent review by Meta verified the integrity of the results.
(emphasis mine)
Apparently the PR slamming they're taking for those studies made them (at least temporarily) remove them from the site...
Re:Part of the page commented out (Score:3)
Oh, you meant the Microsoft [microsoft.com] page? Like the MetaGroup Benchmark [microsoft.com]?
Well, I can understand not wanting to push its own sponsored studies, but why hide the .NET vs J2EE study, do you think? And why can I still download them?
It's Simple (Score:2)
They do it because it works.
Getting the word on the streets (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah... Ok (Score:5, Insightful)
1.Claim that linux isn't free.
2.Pretend that Shared source is the same as Open Source
3.Make a big deal about the migration costs of moving to Linux
4.Use the forrester report to claim that Linux is insecure
5.Belittle the quality of the toolset available on Linux
Point 1 and 2 I won't dignify with a reply.
On Point 3 - Yes, there are migration costs... but that is a dumb argument. There is ALWAYS a migration cost when upgrading (horse and buggy to car - airtravel - spacetravel etc)
4. Yes, linux can be insecure ---- so can windows and anything else (except OpenBSD!!
5. On this point, I dont' care who says what - Microsoft has better (and I mean this in all respects) tools available for Rapid development.
Re:Yeah... Ok (Score:5, Informative)
And they always conveniently forget to mention the cost of upgrading your Microsoft products. My current employer lost a boatload of money when they tried to move from NT to Win2k on the server, because a last-minute backwards incompatibility threw a spanner into the works. The project had to be called off, effectiely wasting several months of effort by about half the engineering group. You do the math on how much that cost the company, nevermind the actual license cost.
They also don't mention that in many cases, a great deal of the cost is inspired by Microsoft's lock-in. Your data in their products isn't open... you have to pry it out. If your data was in open formats (i.e. actual, for-real XML) then you'd be able to migrate a lot easier. So, it's a cost really imposed by Microsoft, rather than a cost imposed by any alternative solution. The erverse probably isn't true... once in an open format, there's usually not an 'exit cost' associated with moving to another solution.
Re:Yeah... Ok (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Yeah... Ok (Score:3, Insightful)
Do we want rapid development? The shorter development stage the greater the chance of overlooked bugs. RAD-tools makes programming, which used to be quite a craftmanship - which required a great deal of intelligence and wisdom, to pointless point and clicking.
Well, it is a sales pitch... (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm kind of heartened by it, as a matter of fact.
What this shows, more than anything, is that Microsoft clearly doesn't understand the enterprise market. What they fail to recognize is this:
Microsoft just doesn't get it. Corporations could care less about streaming video and DirectX. And they aren't fooled by marketing hype - Microsoft can say all they want about "trustworthy computing", but sysadmins know better.
Gandi Quote is germane (Score:5, Insightful)
Then they laugh at you,
Then they fight you,
Then you win.
I'd say that we were at Stage 3 now, we were at Stage 2 last year and the year before.
Things are looking up!
Monday morning vitamins (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Monday morning vitamins (Score:3, Informative)
why every Windows machine in the world shares drive C: at all times as \\IP-address\C$ by default and always, always, always re-enables it at reboot even if you explicitly turn it off
Pet hate o'mine. MS have this tool, MS Baseline Security Advisor, which is actually quite good for hardening Windows - one of the recommendations it makes (every time I run it...) is to disable the default C: share. If only...
Re:Monday morning vitamins (Score:4, Informative)
If you're running and NT-based system (I don't know about the dos-based ones) then you can edit the registry to turn off the auto-creation of the admin shares:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Ser
Set keys AutoShareServer and AutoShareWks to 0
There - not much different from editing a linux config file
Apples to Oranges TCO calculation (Score:5, Informative)
I mean - cm'on, perhaps they should have pitted a walmart PC with windows installed vs Linux running on a Cray server... The TCO takes into account the entire purchase of hardware, and in the Mainframe case - you probably looking at 16 processor machine to begin with, which kind'a spikes the price up...
But - the graph looks very convincing - and isn't it what it's all about?
Just a little food for thought...
They are targeting UK 'near' conversions too... (Score:5, Interesting)
The truth is they are terrified. They've got wind of what's on its way over here in the UK.
Relax, don't panic. Wait and see what us Brits have got coming for MS over the next few months
Re:Completely Off Topic (Score:3, Informative)
Edinburgh event (Score:5, Insightful)
Here's some advice for people who'll be at their next two events (Manchester this week I think, and Wales the week after (Newport, IIRC)):
- Plan in your coffee break questions to ask them (be careful about providing them with the question on paper as they reworded mine - try and ask it in person at the end).
- Ask more about IBM involvement in Linux, they tried to claim that IBM were trying to lock people in to Linux, try and provide counter examples as to how it'd be easier to escape an IBM stranglehold than an MS one.
- They cite interoperability as one of Microsoft's main aims, people mentioned the office file formats and recent patents, but they hedged around the question, someone needs to seriously challenge them on this at the event.
- Talk to the other delegates in clear concise language why you think Linux should be considered as a serious option. Don't sound like a zealot and accept there's many times when Windows would be more suitable than Linux.
- Point out to people that open source doesn't always mean Linux, in fact doesn't always mean changing an OS at all. There's some quality open source software for Windows - promote Firefox and OpenOffice as examples
To summarize... (Score:4, Interesting)
I don't understand a few things about this. Why do people believe this type of thing when Microsoft brings absolutely *NO* proof of any of these claims? Can any of this be considered slander? They're trying to throw mud on Linux's image with no real proof.
And why did this guy sit through this entire "seminar" in the first place?
"Linux isnt free?" (Score:5, Insightful)
I downloaded it, burned it, and installed. I had minimal help and everything went very smoothly.
Er, right.
"linux ISNT free?" "really? heres 10 free copies of mandrake right now." "youll have to pay to support it." "ah, then dont you mean linux SUPPORT isnt free? Is windows support free?" *insert adhominem attack they are trained to do here*
I imagine the best thing you can do at these is hand out free linux install cds, and allow people to make the choice for themselves.
Again, mandrake 10 was SUPRISINGLY easy to get working.
Re:"Linux isnt free?" (Score:3, Interesting)
Funny moment (Score:4, Interesting)
One of my colleagues who also went to the Edinburgh event was talking to one of the speakers there (one of the Nick's from Microsoft I believe) and I Microsoft guy admitted his niece had thousands of viruses on her machine last time he checked it!
I wish I could confirm it, but I don't see he has any reason to lie
Re:Funny moment (Score:4, Interesting)
He went on with the 'industry problem' lie^Hne to reassure us we were all buddies together and all in the same boat, then asked for anyone who trusted their computer to put their hand up (expecting nobody after the 'friendly' subliminals he just slipped us). Both me (FreeBSD user) and my collegue (linux user and security researcher) put our hands up. Mr Okin, bless him, acknowledged our hands but neglected to ask which version of 'windows' we ran
It's True About Desktop Management Tools (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.desktoplinuxconsortium.org/pipermail/d
I think that the crucial missing application and management pieces are staring us all right in the face. It is not enough to have an easy install. It's not enough to have a slick desktop and functional apps. Those are important, certainly, but if we are really doing well at them, why hasn't the momentum shifted?
I've worked IT for fifteen years and the number of systems I've imaged with their OS and software loads dwarfs by 100 to 1 the number of times I've used any OS installer, even if you count the last five years of Install Parties at the Melbourne Florida LUG! The things most developers and non-corporate users think are important don't apply to corporate IT like people outside of IT would think.
The typical larger IT department has to deal with things like corporate software policies, locking user account profiles, automated application and operating system patches/updates and remote helpdesk. How can I enforce the corporate software policy against instant messengers when every distro except debian bundles all the stock KDE applications (including instant messenger apps) in a few giant RPMs? KDE 3.2 will be doing more profile locking features, but what about applications that don't use the KDE libs? What about Gnome?
I know people point to things like Red Carpet and the Red Hat Network for updates (still not 100% in my opinion), but I think corporations will need to be able to build or rebuild apps with different attributes or patches for distribution to corporate clients. SUSE is using 'autobuild' internally and Red Hat wants you to buy a Red Hat Network Proxy, but again, no-one other than Debian provides access to the build architecture to be able to modify certain stock bundled apps like removing parts from larger RPM's like KDE.
Remote helpdesk and other IT-friendly features are available in most distributions at this point, but they aren't really bundled and configured for that role in the context of the distribution. This needs work and attention. VNC is great, but a distro focusing on corporate desktops needs to have that puppy configured for easy remote desktop support by default.
I've spoken at LinuxWorld and other conferences, but every time I try to submit a topic that addresses some of these kinds of issues, I hear crickets and we get 10 more 'How to install Samba' sessions. We need a focus on what all the "Ticket System Cowboys" know about desktop deployments before some of the spectacular Linux desktop announcements turn into craptastic failures.
Just my $0.02.
DaGoodBoy
Re:It's True About Desktop Management Tools (Score:4, Insightful)
There is a relatively obscure distribution in Brazil that, in my opinion, has solved them in a very clever way- Conectiva. They build small RPMs, one for each application, departing from the standard of KDE and Gnome. They also build "meta-RPMs" with 0 bytes, that have dependencies for other RPMs that contains files. This way, for example, you type "rpm -i task-kernel" and install all the RPMs necessary for kernel building.
Conectiva has also adapted apt-get to work with RPMs, making the update and upgrade of the operating system a very simple task.Type apt-get install or click on the graphical front end and way you go.
I don't think that Conectiva is a solution, as they have many problems of their own -their installed base is not big and it takes time to bug reports arrive, compared to Red Hat and Debian. But I would like to see their approach (small RPMS, meta-RPMS, apt-get) copied by other rpm-based distributions.
Re:It's True About Desktop Management Tools (Score:5, Insightful)
Just to expand upon some of your examples a little:
Software package distribution to end-users (a la SMS or Group Policy)
Desktop lockdown policies, e.g. very restricted access for, say, a call centre, "normal" access for the general users, maybe a more elevated level of access for the odd rogue punk
Desktop roaming and profiles, i.e. a user should be able to log on to any desktop and receive all of his/her applications and data
Expanding the above point - if a PC fails, it should be trivial to either re-image or swap out the hardware and have the user back up and running almost immediately. I.e. no local data / no local installs
Strong method of validating integrity of the desktop, particularly in regulated industries (banking, pharmaceuticals etc) - i.e. how can you "prove" that the machine has not been tampered with, and so is operating correctly. Sounds daft? Try working in a regulated industry...
Hardware inventory / monitoring toolkits (in an ideal world, you'd have a single machine image for the whole company to make support of your desktop image easier, but life frequently isn't that simple)
Software inventory / monitoring toolkits (not all software will be freely licensed, you may be distributing some proprietary software that runs on your free systems
Remote control software to enable support staff to assist users remotely
Your examples of automatically distributing patches (and forcing, and preventing logon from un-patched machines) for both OS and applications is exactly right, along with having the control to test and select what patches are distributed to end users. No doubt many of my examples above are already addressed, and this is after all what you'd be paying a Linux expert to help you with (read: commercial support organisation and consultancy - IBM would likely be a good fit, along with many others). Remember, a corporation could well take the view that if it's worth doing, it's worth doing right - i.e. choose Linux for the right reasons, but don't automatically assume that they will want to do it for zero cost - both in the initial purchase price as well as the ongoing maintenance.
Aegilops
In other news (Score:5, Funny)
Why shall I believe any of them?
Linux users could have done a better job (Score:4, Interesting)
Most important Quote from the Forrester report (Score:5, Interesting)
Linux is not free in a corporate environment (Score:4, Insightful)
Sure, you can get Linux for free off any website. However, a company is probabl going to want support for the OS. That costs money. In addition, a company is going to need people to administer the servers. Again, this costs money, both in saleries and training costs.
The only time is Linux is free is when you use it on a home machine and it is your hobby.
Re:Linux is not free in a corporate environment (Score:4, Interesting)
The pro-Windows camp likes to bring up the fact that you need educated system administrators to run a Unix shop, implying that you don't need skilled people to run a Windows shop, all the while neglecting to mention what happens if you place your Windows servers in the hands of an untrained system administrator.
The also like to rag on the command line, neglecting to mention that it enables Unix people to automate complex tasks and neglecting to mention that Windows admins are *also* tied to the command line, albeit a crappier one since You Should Be Using the GUI.
One thing I rarely hear the pro Windows crowd talk about is how many machines the average system administrator can manage. In my experience the number is far higher for Unix systems than it is for Windows.
Re:Linux is not free in a corporate environment (Score:3, Informative)
i'm not being pedantic when i say: linux IS free. you can download it for, um, free.
what you mean is that "the overall cost of running linux is not free", or "contracted support for linux is not free", or "convenient automated OS and application updates for certain distributions are not free".
i think it's important, especially when dealing with linux-curious windows people, to ensure that this is understood:
Re:Linux is not free in a corporate environment (Score:3, Interesting)
Installation and management of unix applications can typically be done from the command line, and many applications that normally use a GUI can at least perform some tasks from the command line. This allows not only oper
Re:Linux is not free in a corporate environment (Score:4, Insightful)
They actually have taken a page from Unix' book and added a lot of command-line tools that can do just about anything you'd need to. You can tie it all together with VBScript run with Windows Scripting Host.
Except, of course, that you are still stuck with a system which is outside of your control. If I tell my Linux/UNIX machine to reboot, and come back in 5 minutes, it will be done (usually), or mighty damned closed to it. I don't even have to watch it. Once I hit enter on the shutdown command (or init), it will all happen as if by magic.
Not so with Windows. On my workstation here at work, I hit reboot, and watch until it gets to the BIOS power-up screen. Then I can walk away. Same is true for every other windows machine. It will decide that the command prompt I've got running is displaying the decryption sequence for al-Qaeda's latest mastermind plan, and therefore it simply cannot reboot right now, no matter that I told it to. Not until I take the initiative and close it can it do the reboot. And that's just one example.
It will reboot when it decides it is time to reboot, and I can't stop it, but when I want it to reboot, well, that's the one time it won't do it. And let's not even get into tasks that won't die when I click End Task Now.
You can tell me all you want about how scriptable Windows is, but here's one that should help demonstrate how scriptable it isn't: How do I script the addition of a new vpn connection under Windows 2000, and make the same script work in Windows XP? Good luck with the answer, I'm still working on it after about two weeks. Of course, under any variety of UNIX, I'd have finished it in all of an hour or so (with a lunch break and a coffee break in the middle, and a bathroom trip too)./P.
Re:Linux is not free in a corporate environment (Score:4, Informative)
Of course no one expects that administering a server will be free as in beer, regardless of the OS. But Linux is still Free as in speech, meaning the source is there, so you can examine and/or modify it to your heart's content. You don't have to worry about Licensing 7.0, or pay $thousands more for additional client access licenses when your network grows, or be stuck with unusable orphaned software if the vendor decides they're not making enough money off of it.
The total cost of being pathetic. (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm one of the lucky ones who successfully made the transition away from Windows to Linux. What was my TCO? I'd say I've spent around $300. That includes the cost of books (most of which were of less help than I hoped), and a copy of Lycoris and its Productivity Pak. (It's a nice distro, but it feels constraining.) Ultimately I became a Mandrake user, and it is installed on all three of my PC's.
Had I stuck with using MS Windows, I would still have spent about $300, and two of my PC's would not be "Kosher" according to MS's EULA. Of course if I were to get "picky" I could toss on the cost of all the additional software (Norton's, Office, etc...) and watch the TCO plow through the roof, but then, I don't want to stoop that low.
I just wish MS, and even some Linux zealots out there would get it through their heads: There are places to use MS Windows, places to use Linux, and even places where either will do nicely. (OK, I'll even include Mac's as having a place as well...)
But to make broad claims that draw illogical conclusions based on a pile of inequitable features-- Well, it's just not very professional, and I'm once again disappointed in Microsoft.
Re:The total cost of being pathetic. (Score:3, Funny)
yeah, and that place is called 'HELL'!
UK Advertising Standard Authority (Score:4, Interesting)
The CAP Code (Ed 11) : GENERAL RULES
SUBSTANTIATION
3.1 Before distributing or submitting a marketing communication for publication, marketers must hold documentary evidence to prove all claims, whether direct or implied, that are capable of objective substantiation.
Relevant evidence should be sent without delay if requested by the ASA or CAP. The adequacy of evidence will be judged on whether it supports both the detailed claims and the overall impression created by the marketing communication. The full name and geographical business address of marketers should be provided without delay if requested by the ASA or CAP.
3.2 If there is a significant division of informed opinion about any claims made in a marketing communication they should not be portrayed as generally agreed.
3.3 Claims for the content of non-fiction books, tapes, videos and the like that have not been independently substantiated should not exaggerate the value, accuracy, scientific validity or practical usefulness of the product.
3.4 Obvious untruths or exaggerations that are unlikely to mislead and incidental minor errors and unorthodox spellings are all allowed provided they do not affect the accuracy or perception of the marketing communication in any material way.
http://www.asa.org.uk/index.asp
Here's one (Score:3, Interesting)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3798393.s
Wimbledon switching to Linux
Response to security concerns of Linux? (Score:3, Interesting)
employees claiming some security failures with
Linux vs Windows.
For the couple of samples I saw, it seems like they
have been very selective about what information
they show. The latest version of Windows Server 2003
vs Fedora Core.
They also plot the number of vulnerabilities
independently of the risk, the impact, or the fact
that some of the security updates are lumped together. Then there is a section on viruses,
they list from some Virus web site about 30
Linux viruses. Never seen a single one of them
in a machine of mine or a server of mine in the
last 12 years.
I would like to know if there are good articulate
responses to those claims. I have been out of the
security loop for a long time, and my constrast
against the Microsoft claims was limited to a few
bits of my own experience.
Marc Cox from Red Hat is quoted by the report,
has he written anything on the subject?
Miguel.
Re:Response to security concerns of Linux? (Score:3, Interesting)
I know of a few projects to produce 'articulate
responses' to MS's claims, not for discussion on a public site yet though
Of course privately...
Point by point rebuttal (Score:3, Insightful)
Linux has been more widely ported than an other OS in history. It is certainly more portable than Windows. When the next, cheaper hardware platform comes around, I expect that by the time it is a commodity, Linux will already be running on it. Furthermore, the cost-effectiveness of particular hardware depends on what you are running on it. Windows doesn't scale up on high-end server hardware. Linux does. With Linux, you have a choice.
Furthermore, the switch from proprietary Unix to Linux is a porting effort that is not particularly difficult. It is certainly easier than making the transition from Unix to Windows. And once you port to Windows, Microsoft has made it very easy to suffer vendor lock-in.
Linux is not free.
This has been a standard Microsoft argument for several years. If they failed to articulate that downloading Debian is not free because of the time and effort involved, then it is their fault for not making that argument clear in their presentation. It is worth noting that there are several costs associated with Windows that have no counterpart with a free Debian download. No licensing costs. The Debian project has never sent the BSA to do an expensive audit of any of its customers. If you reconfigure your hardware with Debian, there are no hassles with reactivating the license. No effort is required to keep employees from taking a copy home. Linux doesn't have a history of viruses and worms. If Microsoft changes the licensing terms of Windows or MS Office, you're stuck. Debian can't change the terms of the GPL. You are always free to use the old terms with the old version and the recent X Windows saga is proof that open source software resists licensing changes very effectively.
"Management tools on Linux are nearly as good as a DOS prompt"
First, every major distro, including the free ones come with some GUI management tools. Second, there is always Webmin [webmin.com]. Third, the Linux shells are scriptable in ways that the DOS prompt was never able to match. Finally, remote administration of a Linux box can be done very easily. You don't need a GUI. Headless Linux boxes have been around from the start. GUI administration is not cost-effective when you are trying to administer as many boxes as possible.
"Linux is moving to the same model that Microsoft has been using"
The GPL won't permit Linux distros to own the code. No matter how many people Microsoft shares their code with, to them sharing means that you can look at it. You can't touch it, play with it, change it, or share it with others. Additionally, Linux and open source have resisted restrictive license changes a couple of times recently. As I said earlier, X Windows is an excellent example of this. If Microsoft wants to make this claim, they have to explain what they mean because several obvious interpretations are clearly not true.
My absolute favourite part of the talk was when Barley started to extol the virtues of Windows because everything in it was made by one manufacturer.
Microsoft will stick to this claim as long as it is absolutely convenient. They are quick to blame others when there are buggy third-party device drivers. And as soon as there is an anti-trust suit, they are even quicker to claim they are open to competition.
He made mention of the Forrester report that claimed more vulnerabilities in Linux than Windows.
Name one exploit that had a widespread effect on Linux boxes. Now, name three that hit Windows in the past month. You can't install and patch a Windows XP system without either a firewall or cleaning up the malware that infects it between the time you connect to the net
If this is all they have MS is in trouble (Score:4, Insightful)
Hmm right. so linux ain't free. Well apart from the fact that it is, what about it? Linux ain't free vs Windows ain't free. At worst this makes it equal to windows.
Right, just get the company lawyer to study the differences. If they can't find any you need a lawyer who can read.
A really dangerous one. You see there is only migration cost from windows -> linux same as there is for companies going from unix -> windows. From unix -> linux, NO MIGRATION WORTH SPEAKING OFF. Certainly no massive retraining. You might be suprised but starting to use linux might mean you can use all those 40+ employees that learned computers on unix systems. MS is saying that people are moving from unix to windows and linux so it is saying that in those cases linux is the better option because of the lesser migration costs?
Oh please. The only comment possible is hysterical laughter. Must have been the comic relieve bit.
The only point that can make sense if your ms. After all MS believes in its own way of doing things and since Linux way != windows way of course they are going to think linux does it wrong. Some people prefer the unix way, some prefer the windows way. These two are never going to meet in the middle except to have a fight.
So a bunch of idiotic claims and 1 that is about taste. Not exactly going to convince me. In fact all this kinda roadshow might do is give linux free advertising. Consider this. How many people will have seen the name linux first in a MS ad? People who never knew there was another OS?
Re:wow (Score:5, Informative)
So I sat with about 150 other "technical decision makers" in a very plush hotel in Holborn while representatives from Microsoft tried their best to convince me that I should not be considering moving to Linux. To run the discussion Microsoft had employed a fake-tan horror who had clearly escaped from daytime TV. He was by turns chummy and condescending. However being a reasonable man I will not hold Microsoft responsible for his failings.
First up was Phillip Dawson who leads Linux research for analysts Meta Group. He quoted heavily from a Meta analysis which shows that Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) for linux and windows is comparable. This study has been widely reported in IT press but I can't for the life of me find a link to the original. He made some interesting points about where the datacentre is going to be in a few years. His basic thrust was that everyone is moving from proprietary Unix with its expensive platforms to Windows or Linux on x86 platforms and that it this hardware move, rather than linux versus windows, that will drive all the cost savings. Dawson believes that in a few years the only place we will see proprietary Unix is in very large enterprise databases.
After a promising start, Dawson then got into the territory of why Windows makes more sense for enterprises than Linux. He introduced what was to become a running theme for seminar, Linux is not free. It turns out that the TCO statements made earlier were based on the licensing costs of SuSE professional and Red Hat Enterprise versus Windows. They had refused to consider that people might run a business on something that they could download free from the Internet. Later in the Q and A session Dawson got quite aggravated when people pointed out to him that many Linux-based businesses run quite happily on free linux (this was shouted by the scruffy-looking Debian hackers in the back). I can only assume that businesses that are brave enough to save thousands of pounds per unit by moving away from expensive hardware platforms are meant not to care that they can save another couple of hundred pounds on Microsoft licence fees. Later in the presentation he said "Don't compare to the free downloads. They are not free". Precisely what he meant by this escapes me.
One area the Meta study didn't look at was Linux on the desktop. Phil claimed that linux was not ready for the desktop because it lacked administrative tools. He was carrying on in a similar vein when he said "Management tools on Linux are nearly as good as a DOS prompt".
Nick Barley, business and Marketing Director for Microsoft UK took to the stage to baffle us with market-speak. There was lots of talk about strategy and leveraging which I didn't follow. He talked a bit about Microsoft's shared-source program and tried his hardest to make it sound like open-source, mainly by refusing to say Open-source and talking about shared-source instead. Continuing in Phillip Dawson's footsteps he repeated the mantra "Linux is not free" several times. Although he was at his best when talking about business models amongst Linux distributors claiming that "Linux is moving to the same model that Microsoft has been using".
My absolute favourite part of the talk was when Barley started to extol the virtues of Windows because everything in it was made by one manufacturer. A fair point which would have been well taken had he not gone on to draw an idiotic analogy. He asked us to imagine an aeroplane where different components were made by different companies. Apparently he's never heard of Airbus.
Next up was Nick McGrath head of platform strategy for Microsoft UK. The main bulk of his talk was taken up by a demonstration of a document sharing system based on Microsoft Sharepoint. Very boring for those of us running heterogeneous systems that Sharepoint will not run on. McGrath was much more technically clued up than Barley, and seemed to be aware that the audience was not entirely on his side. He made me
Re:Linux isn't free (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Enterprise Level (Score:4, Insightful)
In my opinion you are nothing more than a astroturf for MS.
Re:Enterprise Level (Score:3, Informative)
You don't mention if you mean using linux in the desktop or server space, neither what kind of applications or services your refering to when you say "in my experiance". Basicly you give no foundation at all for this comment to be taken seriously at all; Nevermind give the impression that you have any notion of what "Enterprise level" is.
And just saying that Linux isn't 'free' is stating the obv
Re:Enterprise Level (Score:5, Insightful)
Their software, out of the box, runs Sobig, Bagel and Blaster as well as it does IE or Office.
A large part of the cost of administering desktops in a business environment is repairing the damage done by users who have been given excessive system privileges because their applications require them to have them. Linux/Unix apps, as a general rule, don't do that. As a result, it is possible to lock a n*x box down to the point that a user can still do his/her job but he/she cannot wreak havoc on the machine or the network. When the user can only install "goodies in his or her $HOME where they also store their precious data, and pr0n^W other irreplaceable information, they are MUCH more careful about what they click "OK" on. This reduces TCO dramatically.
Just my USD0.02
Re:Enterprise Level (Score:3, Interesting)
Because, of course, no corporation which can consider millions of dollars on licensing fees 'cheap' would be willing to spend a paltry few extra hundred thousand a year to get administrators with more brainpower and a genunie dedication to the technology which they us
Certainly is compared to MS-Windows (Score:4, Insightful)
The only time I use a compiler on this machine is to build software for other people, and it's stuff like a tweaked KDM for an Internet cafe. Let's see you tweak MS Windows Login like that at any price, sucker.
Now... let's have some more facts from Microshills, shall we? Big heaps of steaming facts, coming right up! Mooooove over!
Re:Linux IS NOT FREE (Score:4, Insightful)
The doesn't stop Linux being free and legal to those that are comfortable downloading Linux and supporting it themselves possibly using Google and newsgroups for help.
With Windows you have to pay for a licence just to install the software, you could download it for free but that's illegal, you can't even pay to download it as far as I can see. Then if you need support you have to pay extra for that.
Name the number of personal users and small businesses who have made use of MS support? There'll be some, but not many.
For personal users people usually rely on their friends for support and so they're bogged down fixing the viruses and spyware problems on a regular basis if they're not that savvy.
Re:Not free? (Score:4, Informative)
And while you are at it, don't for get the warehouse to store all those CALs in so that they don't get lost.
br.
Re:Well, it isn't (Score:3, Interesting)
They're also currently using the 'Linux sysadmins are more expensive than Windows sysadmins' argument to promote Windows - however that's only going to have one effect - the more clueful of the Windows sysadmins will learn Linux skills in order to get paid more.
This eventually will mean there's no shortage in Linux sysadmins which will be a plus point for Linu